Matt Maher: F1 excites new supporters, but at what cost?

There is no disguising the way in which the sport’s rules were bent to set up the final lap shoot-out between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen left a bitter taste for many fans and not least Mercedes.

Susie Wolff, wife of CEO Toto, yesterday claimed Hamilton had been ‘robbed’ of the title. Many share that view.

Yet while the ending was contrived, there’s also no denying as a sporting spectacle it was tremendously exciting.

You could certainly make the argument Formula One needed this. For close to a decade the outcome of every season had been predictable and with the races tucked away on subscription TV and viewing figures declining, it felt an increasingly niche sport.

Sunday’s race, shown live on Channel 4, was watched by 7.4million people, many of them casual viewers with no real knowledge or interest in safety car regulations. In terms of entertainment value, they could certainly have no complaints. While the finish might have disgusted some, chances are it earned Formula One a few more followers. It has certainly been a long time since the sport has featured so prominently in the headlines.

It has also, in some ways, been a good week for Hamilton. Unquestionably one of Britain’s greatest-ever sportspeople, the fact so many of his achievements have been out of sight for a terrestrial TV audience – in a sport with waning popularity – means he has not received the adulation deserved (revelations about his tax status, admittedly, haven’t helped).

Yet while he might have been denied a record eighth drivers’ title, his dignified response will have won him new fans.

Those are the positives. The most glaring negative, of course, is that by ripping up the rule book in the name of entertainment, Formula One has sustained a serious hit to its credibility.

Perhaps there really is no such thing as bad publicity. But the line crossed in Abu Dhabi was a dangerous one and the sport would be unwise to do so again.